"It asks me, why am I terrified of it?"
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Jodi writes: "I have a Focusing question that I do not know if you have addressed previously. When focusing alone, I've been looking at an idea/question and what comes up is this great big feeling of tiredness. I get a felt sense of that in my body and experience it as a folding motion into myself. So i say hello to it. It feels surprised that I would want to say to hello to it because it knows that I don't like it."
Ann: Could I comment right there, Jodi? I know you have more to say, but first, let me point to something in your language that suggests there is a relational issue here, between "you" and this part of you. When you say, "It knows that I don't like it," I wondering, who doesn't like it? You? Or something in you?
We need to be Self-in-Presence for Focusing to work. That's why I place so much emphasis the signals that tell us when we are not Self-in-Presence. This one, "It knows that I don't like it," is a big red flag. That would have been a moment to notice: Oops, I've gotten identified with something that is not liking this tired part! And saying Hello to that, too.
Jodi: "Then I notice yet another part of me — this absolute terror coming from that tired part."
Ann: Is the terror coming from the tired part another part? Wouldn't that just be the terror OF the tired part? It sounds like that tired part did feel safe enough to start telling you and showing you what it was feeling, that it was feeling terror.
Jodi: "Terror that I won't see it, terror that it may have to leave. It tells me that this is why it needs to present itself as so big, because otherwise I won't notice it."
Ann: And I hope you said to it, "Ah, no wonder you had to present yourself as so big, if you were worried that otherwise I wouldn't notice you!"
Jodi: "So all of this is fine for me, but then the terror part asks me a question. It asks me, Why am I terrified of it? I don't know what to say. I wonder if I start that dialogue, if I am truly in Presence?"
Ann: "Why" questions presuppose the truth of what they're asking about. "Why are you a libertarian?" assumes that you are a libertarian. "Why didn't you clean up the mess?" assumes that you didn't clean up the mess.
And "Why are you terrified of the tired part?" assumes that you are terrified of the tired part.
The reason not to answer the question is that if you answer it, you are assuming that what it asks is true, that you are terrified of the tired part. But if YOU are terrified of the tired part, then you are identified with another part of you, because in Presence we would not be terrified of a part of us.
The impression I'm getting is that you got another one of those "oops I'm not in Presence" red flags right there. That's a good reason to make sure you're not taking sides, not pushing for any particular outcome, just holding the largest possible space of interesting curiosity, so that what is there in you can find its own way forward.
